A local real estate and investment firm has plans to raze its headquarters building in Camp Springs, Maryland, along with two single-family homes next door, in order to construct a 339K SF commercial, retail and multifamily development.
)
Curtis Investment Group, a real estate developer and investor with retail and commercial projects around the D.C. metro region, filed a proposal for the project at the intersection of Linda Lane and Branch Avenue, and the Prince George’s County Planning Board is scheduled to consider its plans on Thursday.
The plans call for a five-story building, with 104,600 SF of commercial and retail on the first two floors and 105 multifamily units totaling 234K SF on floors three through five.
In the center of the development would be a courtyard cut-out for recreational purposes, according to the proposal. The structure would be surrounded on three sides by surface parking.
The 5.6-acre property now houses Curtis Investment Group's headquarters in a one-story 34,568 SF structure, built in 1986, and two adjacent single-family homes, constructed in 1940 and 1954. The plans call for demolishing those structures to make way for the development.
The proposal didn't say whether Curtis plans to maintain its headquarters in the new building after the development or relocate it.
Curtis declined to comment. The company’s lawyer who is named on the proposal, Matthew Tedesco, didn't respond to a request for comment.
)
The property sits less than a mile south of the Beltway and less than 3 miles from the Branch Avenue Metro station, the southern terminus of the Green Line. It is also less than 5 miles from the Joint Base Andrews military facility.
Curtis Investment Group traces its roots back to 1926, when George Curtis Sr. opened a Curtis Brothers Furniture Store in Anacostia, according to its website. The furniture retailer expanded for years before transitioning into real estate, and it now mostly invests in commercial properties but also owns four residential properties in Southeast D.C.
Its commercial properties include nearly a dozen retail shops along Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue in Anacostia, the 57K SF Annandale Shopping Center and a 27K SF strip mall in Centreville, Virginia, Centreville Plaza.
The company is also behind Anacostia’s famed “Big Chair” on MLK Avenue, built in 1959 for the Curtis Brothers Furniture Co. store, which was located on the block.
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)